There was once her famous shaykh who was revered by everyone in the small town where he lived, but he was always in debt. Renowned for his generosity and selflessness, he gave away to the poor everything that he was given by the rich. With the last donation he had received from a wealthy patron, he built a Sufi house, leaving himself with nothing to spare. He remained untroubled, though, as his debts had always been paid through the grace of God -until then! His life's end was approaching, and he lay in bed contentedly, melting away like a candle, while his creditors gathered around him, sour faced and desperate as they had no hope of collecting what was owed to them.
“Look at these untrusting fellows!” he thought as he watched them from his sick bed. “How could they not trust that God will repay my measly debt?”
In a trice, he heard a child voice outside selling sweet halwa. The shaykh ordered his manservant to purchase the entire tray; hoping that perhaps when the angry creditors ate something sweet, they would not glare at him with such bitterness and disdain. The servant bargained with the child and bought the whole tray for half a dinar, setting it down before the men. The shaykh graciously invited them to enjoy it. When the tray was polished clean the boy asked for his money.
“How do you expect me to pay you?” the shaykh retorted. “I am on my deathbed; go away, leave me in peace!”
Frustrated and overcome with grief at his loss, the boy hurled the empty tray on to the floor, wailing uncontrollably. He cried out, wishing that his legs had been broken or that instead he had gone to sell his sweets at the bathhouse rather than at this wretched Sufi house with its freeloading Mystics. A crowd gathered around the boy as his sobs echoed throughout the neighborhood: “Great Shaykh, I assure you that my master will murder me on the spot if I return empty- handed. How can your conscience permit this injustice?” he pleaded with the shaykh as he stumbled up to his side.
“What are you conjuring?” protested the creditors at the dying shaykh. “You have already usurped our wealth. How could you now bring such misfortune upon this poor lad?”
Impervious to the men’s retorts and pretending to be unaffected by the weeping boy; the Shaykh pulled his quilt over his head and slept soundly. The boy remained beside him, weeping until the next prayer time, and the shaykh did not glance at him once.
Why would the full moon, in all its glory, be bothered by the barking of the moonstruck dogs? Does the moon even hear their noise? The beasts do their job while the moon does its own, spreading light all over the world. All things on earth and above do their own little task; running water does not lose its clarity or calm because of the straw and dust that float on its surface! The king, amused by his entertainers, drinks his wine by the stream until dawn, unaware of the cacophony of the frogs around.
Had the creditors collectively dug into their pockets to gather the half dinar that the shaykh owed the boy, they could have easily paid him off. Yet the will of the shaykh prevented them from exercising their generosity and the boy from receiving anything at all. such, and much more, is the power and mystery of a Sufi.
At the next prayer time, a servant arrived with a covered tray sent by one of the shaykh’s wealthy admirers who knew that he was unwell and did not have much longer to live. The servant paid his respects and let the tray before the shaykh from, lifting the cover to expose a small banquet of exquisite suites. Much to everyone surprise, they are lay 400 dinars in a corner of the tray and half a dinar separately wrapped in a cloth by their side. The creditors gasped in awe, unable to fathom how the shaykh had managed to bring about such a miracle of course instantly they repented, ashamed to have ever doubted his powers and begged his forgiveness.
“I forgive you all your doubts,” the shaykh replied. “Go in peace. I asked God to show me the right way, and thus he did! Although this half denied is not worth much, to gain it depended on the tears of the child! And list the sweet seller boy cried his heart out, the doors of benevolence would not be flung open. My brothers by the child I mean the child in your own eyes! Consider your needs fulfilled once you shed tears. If you want to be the recipient of unbounded generosity, make the child in your eyes cry for your earthly body.”
We cannot judge the behavior of mistakes with our simple minds. Unless we suffer occasionally and express our hopelessness, the doors of grace cannot be opened to us; as in this case, the boy’s tears were required before the gates of generosity could be unlatched.
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